Sausage Pasta with Spinach and Leeks

This light and creamy sausage pasta is luscious and flavorful. The spinach and leeks add color and freshness to this no-fuss recipe. This is a great meal for busy nights!’

This Sausage Pasta was inspired by a recent text to the Johnsonville Sausage Support Center. If you look on their website you’ll see that you can call 844-9-SAUSAGE or text 97406 and ask a real live Johnsonville employee anything having to do with sausage. You can call that number for recipes, advice, tips, product info or just to make sure your phone works.

Ok, don’t call just to make sure your phone works. The people manning the phones are there to help people with food issues, not phone issues. I speak from experience here. If anyone remembers calling time and temperature, please leave me a comment. I’m not super old but old enough to remember a time without cell phones. A time where you could call a computer operated number that would give you the current time and the exact temperature. I would call this when I was bored or when I was sure I guy would call but didn’t and I needed to be verify that it wasn’t because my phone was dead. So there I’ve managed to date and embarrass myself in one paragraph.

I’ve come a long way with my phone. I traded my land line for a cell phone and I no longer make unnecessary (and deperately sad) phone calls. These days I mostly text. In fact, I texted the number above to ask for quick and easy family dinner idea. It took only minutes before I received a friendly text back with a quick and easy dinner to serve my family. The suggestion was for Johnsonville Cabbage and Noodle Skillet recipe. I loved the idea and I was impressed by the quick response! Ultimately I settled upon a recipe using ingredients I already had in the fridge.

For this Sausage Pasta recipe I cooked Johnsonville Original Brats in a deep skillet. I cooked freshly chopped leeks and garlic as well. Pasta shells, chicken broth, Parmesan cheese and vibrantly green spinach finished out the meal. This is one pot meal that is light, creamy and completely delicious!

Sausage Pasta with Spinach and Leeks

This light and creamy sausage pasta is luscious and flavorful. The spinach and leeks add color and freshness to this no-fuss recipe. This is a great meal for busy nights!

Ingredients

1 19 oz package Johnsonville Original Brats

3/4 cup chopped leeks

2 cloves minced garlic

1 lb pasta shells

2 32 oz cartons low-sodium chicken broth

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon Italian blend seasoning

3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese

1 1/2 cups fresh spinach

Instructions

Cook brats according to package directions in a deep skillet. When brats are fully cooked, remove the brats and set aside. Add the leeks to the same skillet and cook until they begin to soften. Add garlic and cook for one minute.

Add pasta shells to the same skillet. Stir in the chicken broth. Cover and cook the pasta on medium to medium low for 20-25 minutes stirring occasionally. Continue to cook until the pasta is soft and the broth has been mostly absorbed. Stir in Italian seasoning and Parmesan cheese. Stir pasta just until the cheese has melted. Remove the pasta from the heat and stir in the fresh spinach.

Slice the brats and add them to the pasta just before serving.

by Tanya Schroeder

Recipe Notes

Be sure to wash the leeks as sometimes dirt gets trapped inside. I used the whites in this recipe.

Watch the pasta carefully. Having a lid on the pasta could cause it to bubble up. Stirring periodically will help prevent this.

Allowing the broth to absorb as the pasta cooks creates a very creamy texture to the pasta without having to use a lot of cheese or cream.

This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Johnsonville. The opinions and text are all mine.